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Director Shawn Levy learned a lot about using the camera for comedy while filming 2006’s The Pink Panther
Sharing how the crime comedy helped his work with Marvel, Levy explains that “the camera is a participant in the joke telling. And more often than not, the simpler approach is the funnier approach”
The Pink Panther celebrated its 20th anniversary in February
While Shawn Levy has had a long career spanning many different movies, The Pink Panther had a big impact on him as a director. The 57-year-old filmmaker shares that he learned about how to use the camera as part of the joke for more comedic scenes while working on the 2006 crime farce.
One scene from the movie, he tells PEOPLE, changed how the director framed particularly funny moments on screen.
Inspector Clouseau (Steve Martin) is following Beyoncé’s character, Xania, around New York City. When he believes he is found out, he yells, “Newspapers,” and pulls out a large newspaper to hide his face. After he pulls out the prop, he doesn’t see the subway entrance and then falls down the stairs.
“I remember that because that movie was pretty early in my career, and it’s the film that got me thinking about how the frame helps tell the joke,” Levy shares.
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“I remember considering a bunch of other angles where I would’ve shown a stuntman tumbling down the stairwell from behind and then from the front towards the lens,” he continues. “That was an epiphany moment where I realized, ‘Oh, the camera is a participant in the joke telling. And more often than not, the simpler approach is the funnier approach.’ “
The director —who has gone on to helm Night at the Museum, Date Night, episodes of Stranger Things as well as the upcoming Star Wars: Starfighter — says he “learned this the hard way on other movies.”
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“I’ve tried a complex camera move in the midst of a joke, and it muddies the laugh. Steve not seeing stairs approaching because his face is hidden by the newspaper. That was an example of one uninterrupted frame that makes the joke land in a funnier way,” Levy says.
Years later, when he was filming 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine, there was a massive scene in which Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) fought over 60 other Deadpools.
“That’s a similar shot, one uninterrupted, laterally moving wide shot. But The Pink Panther was where I first started my education in film comedy and how the camera needs to be a participant,” Levy recalls.
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In addition to Beyoncé, 44, and Martin, 80, The Pink Panther starred Jean Reno, Kevin Kline, Emily Mortimer and Henry Czerny, to name a few.
When it come to rebooting the crime comedy movie franchise as the the time, Levy shares that “everybody came with a respect for the legacy we were inheriting and respect for the screenplay that Steve Martin had written.”
There was also “a commitment to have fun and try to parlay that fun off-screen into fun on-screen for audiences,” Levy adds. “When the movie became such a big hit, it was really gratifying. We knew we would take our shots critically. You don’t touch a classic like that and not run that risk. The way audiences embraced the movie and Steve in this new incarnation of Clouseau was really affirming.”
The Pink Panther, first released in theaters on Feb. 10, 2006, is available to stream on Kanopy and Roku TV.
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